Hetampur Hazarduari Rajbari, Birbhum

Yes I know I haven't written in a long, long time. Cutting a long story short, I was with my friend Kshitish on October 9th travelling from Durgapur (where my college is) to Calcutta to enjoy the Durga Puja festivities when the bus we were in was hit from behind by a speeding truck. Besides breaking my camera, I also ended up with 14 fractures in my left arm when it hit the metal backrest at great velocity. Also my arm muscles got crushed, the skin burst apart because of the impact & the wounds were so severe that I  had to get over 100 sutures, 6 excruciating surgeries & 4 skin grafts. As of now, am recuperating at home - thanks to physiotherapy & medicines, the bones & the muscles are healing gradually, but I still have extensive neural damage that restricts the movement of my joints so I can't open any of my fingers or rotate my elbow & wrist joints. The doctors have advised me not to travel for 3-4 months more atleast. In the meanwhile, I'll complete the articles that I was supposed to write but never got around to researching, starting with this one that I was working on at the time of the accident. I am not guaranteeing that the posts would be regular & numerous like before, but I promise I'll do my best!! Happy reading!!

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Next to a wide highway crawling through lush green fields lies a small rural hamlet, more of an agglomerate of mediocre houses, tiny shops & shanties, roadside eateries & unpaved, pockmarked & rain-drenched roads – each of these suitably encapsulated within a little grove of its own by the roadside. Massive trucks & lorries loiter past; migratory birds call their pit stops here; the spread of vegetation soothes the eyes; the water bodies that naturally come to life after every cycle of rains provide spots for the flora of the region to flourish, the fauna to quench their thirst & the kids to escape the tropical sun & the humidity that comes with the rains in this part of the world. Dark, ominous clouds shroud the sky, bringing with them hordes of insects, especially dragonflies, masses of which try to follow every moving body – be it a truck, a person or cattle. The greenery, the highway snaking through it & the gnarled trees – each of these together conspire to present a picture of harmonious bliss, an idyllic setting unimpeded by the rush of modernity engulfing the world round it, undisturbed by the events, big & small, happening near & far. The impression of an Indian village is further completed by the presence of small hutments, still smaller temples & cattle grazing around the fields & the water bodies.

The remains of the impressive palace & the modern school building (right foreground)

But sticking out like a sore thumb in the middle of this little green paradise is a huge palace that would perhaps have felt more at home in the plains of Europe. Ill-suited for an Indian setting, it was constructed when the Europeans – the British, Dutch, Portuguese & French – came calling at India’s shores in search of riches & treasures & claimed a position of power & authority to both commission & influence construction activity reminiscent of their native places. The Indian subjects, including the Nawabs & the Zamindars (vassals) - each of them exploited & subjugated in one way or the other - were only too eager to please their European lords in order to avoid further taxation & hardships. The Nawabs, merchants & wealthy govt. officials adopted European cultural & architectural practices – soon, it was Gothic & Victorian architectural that came to define the building scene in India, even in far-flung villages like Hetampur where the British had made their writ established. In 1905, the royal family of Hetampur (a corruption of “Hatempur”, after the then Zamindar Hatem Khan) commissioned a massive Gothic palace, the protagonist of this post, as their privileged residence – the gigantic structure boasts of 999 doors in its plan (one less than the thousand doors of the Murshidabad royal palace as a mark of respect to the most powerful rulers of Bengal), hence christened as “Hazarduari” (“Thousand doors”) “Rajbari” (“Royal residence”) – but one look at the building & one bemoans the fate of the palace that has certainly seen far better days.

Some of the 999 doors - View from an inner courtyard

The Hetampur royal family was established by Radhanath Chakravarty who rose from meager beginnings & subdued the Roys, the then ruling family, to establish a stronghold which he further fortified by buying huge tracts of lands in & around Birbhum & defeating contending rulers & zamindars. He accepted British suzerainty & was granted the title of “Maharaja” (a nominal title, literally “king”, bestowed by the British government; abolished along with the vassal system & hereditary titles when India gained its freedom) by the British Indian government in 1796. His sons & grandsons further expanded the family’s territorial domain & influence & they finally became the most powerful family in the whole of Birbhum, bringing their former masters, the Roys & the Rajnagar family, under their thumb. Maharaja Ram Ranjan Chakravarty (born 1851, died 1912) rendered invaluable help to the government during the disastrous famine of 1874 & was thus granted the title of “Bahadur”. He commissioned the magnificent Rajbari (it was then known as “Ranjan Palace”, christened after the Maharaja) & though he himself did not live long enough to enjoy the pleasures afforded by this Neo-Classical mansion, he left it behind as a souvenir of his rich & fertile reign.

Built to awe - This is just the gateway of the complex!!

A grand red brick gateway, supported by massive Corinthian pillars & interspersed with arched windows & entrances, ushers visitors inside the huge complex that houses the forgotten palace. Marked by slender protruding eaves supported on equally-spaced brackets & topped by several feminine figurines with their arms outstretched, the gateway itself is a commanding structure – the central portion, raised higher than the extremities & supported by tall pillars gives it a militaristic look – on first sight it seems as if there would be armed guards keeping an eye at visitors from the red-painted arched windows on the first floor – but reality often betrays expectations & imaginations – small children no more than 7-8 years of age look at us with wide eyes, giggling & scuttling away as soon as we fish out our cameras. The palace houses a DAV school & a B.Ed college in its premises & hence the young scholars.

The royal quarters

Enter the gateway & one comes against a vast expanse that renders even considering this stretch as part of a palace compound into a struggle. Several trucks were parked shoulder to shoulder, many of them filled with what looked like coal, others revving up & readying to move out; mounds of debris & coal lay hitherto over open, dust-laden ground. Elsewhere, weeds & creepers seemed to have overtaken the entire ground, from the broken wooden doors that lay half-hidden amidst the all-encompassing vegetation to the moss-laden octagonal well that appeared more green than brown – so much so that we could not photograph the twin wings that make up the palace from the front & had to make do with a side shot. Stepping through the desolation, the ruinous state of the once magnificent palace came as no surprise – the thick, yellow pillars had turned brownish-green due to decay; all the features that described the Victorian architecture of the structure, including the ornamental tops of the Corinthian pillars, the plasterwork along the pyramidal roof & other decorative features such as the crenellations along the roof are almost gone, turned into an indecipherable, indistinguishable smudgy mask over the yellow walls & the blue rooftops; most of the original expensive Burma teak doors & windows have since been stolen & were never replaced. That the massive palace was once an impressive example of English architecture in this distant corner of the world is beyond doubt, but today a clothesline & broken furniture strewn around the structure mar the little grandeur & sophistication it is left with. Sadly the interiors are in an even worst state compared to the exteriors – by the means of wooden semi-walls & divisions, the ground floor (painted vivid blue throughout!!) has been partitioned into separate quarters for the several families that now live here. A thick layer of dust covers everything that does not move, from the wooden partitions to the portraits on the walls; in an especially secluded corner marked by thick cobwebs, an old Bajaj scooter stands next to old riff-raff including wooden cupboards, plastic containers, a few clothes & an idol of an old, bespectacled man.

Shabby & ignored - The palace interiors

Through the maze of rooms & their sub-divisions we finally found the stairway leading to the upper floor – a huge trapdoor angled along the incline of the staircase was a surprise to us as this was the first time we were seeing something like this - the heavy steel door could be forced shut at the time of aggression or an enemy siege. The first floor is considerably well maintained compared to the ground floor – the walls retain their original character; the framed photographs hanging on the walls were covered only in a minute layer of dust. The harmony was shattered by a disused, broken wooden palanquin comfortably tacked in the verandah, its musty interiors stuffed with old files & wood shavings, a hay stack lying along one of its sides & submerging the wooden poles that the bearers would have once held to carry the palanquin & the royal personage seated within. In one of the rooms sat the present head of the Hetampur royal family - an old Zamindar bent double with age, whose cough could be heard resounding through the whole floor – one of the attendants tending to him told us that both the "Raja" & his wife are gravely ill, both of them having had a stroke within a quarter year of each other. But the Raja was gracious enough to allow us to photograph his palace provided we did not make much noise (fine, I must have told the attendants about this blog & the other publications I write for along with the sentence “But we have come from Delhi!!” to coax them for permission).

The unique trapdoor

Two of the rooms, now converted into classrooms, still display much of the original paintwork they were embellished with including floral motifs (around the arched doorways & even the light switches!!) & striking frescoes depicting scenes from Indian mythology, splendidly painted & vividly-colored,  executed in arched niches above the many doors that line the room's perimeter. Even the roof overlooking the wide staircase is done in huge, green & pink, four-pointed star motifs inlaid with more floral patterns. From the corridors one can look down to the courtyards enclosed by the palace (& wonder what are those big, black silos doing in the courtyard??). Looking at those numerous doors sprouting out from each wall & guessing which one leads where one indeed feels like “Alice in Wonderland”.

One of the vivid frescoes executed in a large room that now serves as a classroom

The palace building is flanked by an equally large white building which houses the school & college & thankfully possesses considerably lesser number of doors than the palace building. Between the two, a narrow path leads to the roofed shelter where the royal chariot is parked – though the chariot appears as if it could be of service for a few more years, the shelter itself is crumbling apart with the paint flaking off the walls, the pillars caved in at places & the whole area submerged in black muck & hay. One has to get her/his shoes dirty to photograph the chariot. At one time, there must have been elephants roaming the massive grounds of the palace complex & their trainers working on them; Sadly, even the horses are missing at present. Strewn around the shelter lay branches hacked off from trees, perhaps to be used as fuel wood; an upturned & grievously crushed motorcycle stood vertically upturned in the middle of the log pile – hilariously I hoped the inhabitants won't burn the motorcycle when they light the fire!! A large room that can be entered from the door preceding the chariot shelter houses a small police station too. The contribution of the Hetampur royal family towards the police & education system is quite evident – the colleges & schools that exist in this small administrative sub-division have all been founded by the royal family.

Portraits - The one on the top is that of the Chandranath Shiva Temple nearby that is patronized by the royal family

Adjacent to the white building is a flight of stairs that leads to the huge pond teeming with lotuses & flies alike. Sitting on the steps closest to the pond is bliss, especially since my friends Kshitish & Aakash are there to discuss college gossip & girlfriend stuff. It totally turned out to be a boy’s day out for us.

What would it look like in spring!!?

As we stepped out of the small hamlet & started walking along the highway towards our next destination, we fell into a discussion regarding the state of the ruined palace & what would happen to it in coming few years – the Raja & his wife seemed so frail & terribly ill, will their family care for this hereditary possession after they have passed away?? Or will it fall into an even bitter state of neglect & despair?? Interestingly, the Rajbari has featured in several films made by Hindi & Bengali directors, most notable among them being Satyajit Ray!! Regardless of the palace's short & forgotten theatrical association, one is forced to ask why the government should bother with its upkeep & conservation when there are so many more magnificent instances of architecture & heritage lying in equal or worse state of disrepair/disregard. Why would anyone, except for heritage enthusiasts like us, bother about an old, crumbling building that exists in a seldom-visited part of a far-flung state where even basic facilities of residence & safety are non-existent (read my post about the nearby Chandranath Temple here - Pixelated Memories - Chandranath Shiva Temple, we came across a small roadside eatery where even normal-looking bottled beer tasted evil).

I wish I was also taught in a palace :(

Some enlightened souls might argue that some structures are meant to disappear after their lease of life has expired, but they forget that it is us who through our ignorance & selfishness allowed these buildings which form an important link to our colonial past come to a stage where their structure has fallen apart & originality lost. That these should be preserved & restored to their original state even when the monetary/tourism benefits are not foreseeable in the near future is non-negotiable. We can only hope that following this & similar articles the tourists flow in & with them comes awareness & effort before it is too late for this & other splendid architectural specimens.
Our thanks to the Raja for allowing us to photograph his estate to our heart’s delight!!

Location: Hetampur village, Birbhum
How to reach: SBSTC Buses are available from different parts of Bengal to Hetampur. Alternately one can reach Suri, the headquarters of Birbhum & take a bus from there to Hetampur (Approx. 1.5hr away). The Rajbari is known to everyone, ask your way around.
Entrance Fee: Nil
Photography/Video charges: Nil
Time required for sightseeing: 1 hr

Relevant Links - 

1. Pixelated Memories - Chandranath Shiva Temple

Suggested Reading -

1. Facebook.com/An Era of Indian Zamindars, Taluqdars, Jagirdars - Hetampur Raj
2. Flickr.com/Kanad Sanyal - Gateway to Lost Grandeur
3. Iinet.net.au - Hetampur (Zamindari)
4. Telegraphindia.com - Article "When the hurlyburly's done" (dated March 4, 2010) by Anusua Mukherjee
5. Thenomadicarchaeologist.com - Prisoner of Silhouette
6. Travel.outlookindia.com - Feats of Clay - Bengal beyond Bishnupur

Indian Museum, Calcutta

"There was one class of public building in which the British in India truly excelled: the museum. It was the one class of building, too, that the Indian masses treated with reverence – They called a museum a “House of Wonder”." 

- Jan Morris, author "Stones of Empire: The Buildings of the Raj"

One of the most famous landmarks in Calcutta & the commander of unbridled public & media interest, the Indian Museum at Jawahar Lal Nehru Street witnesses long queues of visitors every morning outside its ticket counter. Eager to get into the building they refer to as “Jaadughar” (“House of Wonder”), the crowd consists of students, old grandparents accompanied by their grandchildren, foreigners, tourists, research scholars & even the poor & the underclass of the city & its suburbs. The grand white Neoclassical-style building completed in the year 1878 was designed by the famous British architect Walter Granville (who also designed the Calcutta High Court & General Post Office, refer Pixelated Memories - General Post Office. He passed away in the year 1874 & could not see the museum being completed).

A photograph of the museum taken by Francis Frith between the year 1850-70 (Photo courtesy - Oldindianphotos.in)

On the whole, the structure appears at unease with its 21st century surroundings – located next to the Oberoi Grand Hotel, the museum building disappears behind stalls selling stuff like key rings, purses & wallets, second-hand books/magazines/atlases & encyclopedias; there are a few hawkers selling eatables such as pakodas (deep-fried snacks made with gram flour batter), tea, cigarettes & luchi (Bengali deep-fried bread); the vendors who do not yet possess a cart/stall take to sitting on the pavement to display their wares which include bedsheets, melaware cups & other bric-a-brac – it seems as if the whole museum building is going to vanish out of plain sight much like the Sirius Residence in the Harry Potter movies. The issue is further compounded by the presence of a flyover opposite the museum – Walter Granville’s magnificent masterpiece has ceased to resemble its own self; comparing the present-day photographs to the earlier sketches & photographs, one is forced to wonder if development & urbanization are essentially beneficial. In this case, they aren’t, visually, historically or emotionally either. Bronze letters spell out “Indian Museum” in Hindi, English & Bengali while a CCTV camera keeps watch over the passer-bys. A few broken chairs, a movable steel staircase & potbellied & unshaved guards make up the first set of artifacts one notices, definite remnants of a long gone golden age. Thankfully for a museum this old & notorious for being one always at the receiving hand of official apathy & callousness, the visitors won’t forget it & keep flocking day in, day out to see the items on display in their musty, dirt-covered cases & rusty, old hangings. 

One of the galleries (Photo courtesy - Wikimedia.org)

A remnant of Italian architecture in this essentially old city, the museum building has been in news for several past years largely for all the wrong reasons – indecent restoration work, thefts & financial irregularities, failed structural additions, locked galleries & uncooperative staff (see the article links at the end of this post).

The oldest & largest museum in the country & one of the first of its kind in all of Asia, the museum had meager beginnings – though the modern structure came into existence in 1874-78, the priceless artifacts & specimens it hosts came from the private collection of Danish botanist Nathaniel Wallich who in 1814 convinced the Asiatic Society about the need to start a museum in India & got them to lend him space on their premises for housing his collection which grew as donations from native princes & English officers started to come in, culminating in one of the largest collections of its kind in Asia. Soon the Government granted land to build the museum in its modern form as we know it. 

A display depicting the attire & physical features of the Nicobarese tribe (Photo courtesy - Wikimedia.org)

That the building is huge there is no doubt about (it provides over 10,000 square feet area for display), however the measure of its scale cannot be had from the outside – once you are past the ticket counter, rude guards who seem more adept at shouting at visitors & the crowds of large-eyed visitors & get to stand in the courtyard around which this massive three-storey structure takes the form of long colonnaded walkways, it is then that you begin to fathom the nature & number of the wonders that await you. Thus begins the journey of another large-eyed visitor through collections more than two-century old of stuff that ranges from being two-century old to two-million year old, all stacked up right & left for your pleasure till you are out of breathe because of the huge intake of history, art, anthropology & natural sciences you just had!!

A sculpture of Goddess Tara dated back to 10th Century & discovered in Lalitagiri

The simplistically designed building has been divided into several galleries depending on what they feature. The collection is so large that there are specimens spilling everywhere, large Buddha statues & stone reliefs stand in the corridors as if it’s the most natural thing to do!! The museum management, in another instance of bureaucratic idiocy, have allowed still camera photography for a payment of Rs 300 but prohibited video & mobile camera photography, in fact visitors are asked to switch off their mobile phones on entering the premises – what am I supposed to do (I don’t own a camera yet) except look for a chance to click pictures when the guards aren’t looking?? The guards prove to be rude, their idea of stopping tourists from clicking pictures involves confrontation, shouting & shoving the haggled visitors till they delete the photos from their phones & showing them the way out if all else fails – now a Chinese couple might get heckled when you behave so (yeah that’s the first thing we saw when we entered the museum), but three, well-built college students who have spent all their life in Delhi, Haryana & Uttar Pradesh?? Guards zero, Students one; first fix your stupid rules, then lecture us!! Interestingly, even those who possessed a camera & bought photography tickets were being stopped after every few steps by more guards asking to see the tickets. We are just clicking, not stealing artifacts, why get your pants in such a bunch?? The entire museum is under CCTV supervision & the staff appear quickly if a visitors flouts the two basic rules here – “No Photography” & “No touching the cases”. We had a panic moment when a young lady walked up to us in the archaeological gallery & inquired if we were taking photos; I guess our poker face isn’t as good as we thought it was because she did not believe us for a second & pointed towards the CCTV cameras fixed along the ceiling – so that’s why there aren’t any guards in this gallery!! Turned out she was another visitor who then joined us in taking photos, the more the merrier!!

Coming to the galleries, the museum is divided into 6 of them –
1. One of my least favorite galleries, the Geological section is stuffed with millions of stone (precious, ornamental & ordinary), marble & rock specimens filled in glass case upon case. There are few interesting items such as meteorite fragments & fossils thrown in too, but in a gallery this large, looking for them was like looking for a needle in a haystack. Could definitely make do with a change in the arrangement & the usage of signs to point to the different categories of rocks housed (much like a library with shelves marked with subject names). But at least it appealed to my friends studying Metallurgy; they were almost drooling on the cases!

2. The Archaeological Section contains sculptures belonging to the Gandhara & Mathura styles of art, over 50,000 coins from the reign of several emperors dating far back to 5th century BC, carvings & statues from several Buddhist stupas & some Egyptian antiquities. The Egyptian gallery even boasts of a 4,000 year old Mummy. There are hundreds of sculptures, you’ll get tired looking at them but there would be no end in sight!

Another statue, this one read "Manjuari", I don't know what that means

3. The Anthropological Section is one of the most fascinating amongst all the galleries with large display cases depicting the life, attire & habitat of the different tribes living in the subcontinent. Then there is another impressive section that displays the different phases of human evolution – the aesthetic setup is well-designed – the glass panels holding the skeletal remains & the replicas of human ancestors are lit only by single red bulbs that light up only the facial features & lend an eerie air to the scene. A third display is devoted to masks used for rituals by various tribes in the country. To my utter surprise & delight, on display in a separate room is a skeleton (OK, only the skull) of Rajasaurus narmadadeva, the only dinosaur ever found in the Indian subcontinent. This was more than I ever expected!! 

Some of the masks in the Mask Gallery (Photo courtesy - Indianmuseumkolkata.org - Mask Gallery)

4. The Art Section has galleries dedicated to textiles, paintings, decorative art objects from different parts of the country. The exhibit also includes jewellery, silverware & ornaments, bone art, wood work, metal pieces, sculptures, carved ivory & rhinoceros horn articles, pottery & such.

5. The Zoological Section, my favorite, boasts of remarkable specimens of flora & fauna – there were deer antlers hung from wall alcoves, a huge walrus is the masterpiece flanked by mammoth & hippopotamus skeletons sprawled on the floor in the center of the room, a gigantic whale skeleton that seemed to be swimming in air since it was hung from the ceiling through bearings nailed in the roof, butterflies in glass cases, animal embryos preserved in bottles, stuffed animal hides & a study of taxidermy, specimens of fish, plant life & several species of insects.

The elephant & hippopotamus specimens (Photo courtesy - Wikimedia.org)

6. We skipped the Industrial Section where botanical specimens bearing upon medicine, agriculture and industry are displayed.

Funded by the Indian Government, the museum is an autonomous organization enshrined in the Constitution of India as “an institute of national importance”, however like most government institutions, the upkeep here is far from good. Most of the display cases are covered with a layer of dust (perhaps the cleaners also cite the rule “Don’t touch the glass cases”!!), half of the sculptures & carvings kept in the open courtyard are at the mercy of natural elements, the zoological samples have started showing signs of decay & many of them look like old, dirty teddy bears rather than real animals. Thankfully, the museum is headed towards much needed repair, restoration & conservation work as part of its bicentennial celebrations in 2014; in fact some repair work was already in full swing when we visited the place with structural additions being made/removed, strengthening & painting of walls, restoration of specimens – some of the galleries were locked on account of the same. We do hope that the authorities & workers won’t resort to shoddy repair work resulting in structural damage as has been noted in newspaper reports to have occurred some years earlier. As mentioned earlier, the guards were rude brutes, however once you ignore them the rest of the staff is pretty friendly & knowledgeable – the guy at Zoology section was a trove of knowledge & well-versed with the details of the specimens stacked. Interestingly the Zoological Survey of India & the Geological Survey of India are offshoots of this very museum!

Embryo specimens (Photo courtesy - Davidboyk.com)

An in-house publication division stocks books (on various topics such as history, paleontology, archaeology & Buddhism), scaled-down replicas of the various sculptures & Buddha statues on display in the museum, postcard sets (depicting Indian mythology (primarily representation of paintings dealing with certain events in the life of the mythological king Krishna, considered to be an incarnation of the Hindu God of life & nourishment, Vishnu), important archaeological finds (the lion emblem from Sarnath, Yakshini statue), Mughal paintings & such). The statues & books were quite expensive so I had to be content with buying the postcards (I bought all the sets though – the “About Me” of this blog does list philately as one of my hobbies).

Despite its reputation as an institution stuck in the thrall of bureaucratic high-handedness & ignorance & despite the general belief of museums being insanely dull & boring, this museum is actually a treasure trove – though you might have to oversee the dust-coated display cases (you can actually trace your name in the dust for other visitors to see!) or plaques containing so much information (yes I know the statue is old, can’t you be specific as to how old instead of just noting “Old”??), but nonetheless the museum does prove to be impressive & promises to increase your knowledge several folds while being a visual delight. Not only just nerds but everyone visiting or living in Calcutta should frequent the place at least once, it deserves it. And don’t touch the cases please, the guards are prickly!

Sphinx statue from Egypt (Photo courtesy - Wikipedia.org)

Location:  Next to the Oberoi Calcutta, Park Street. Five minutes walk from Esplanade bus terminus
Nearest Metro Station: Park Street
How to reach: Buses & taxis are available from different parts of the city to the museum. One can walk from Esplanade to the museum.
Open: All days, except Mondays & national holidays.
Timings : 10 am - 5 pm (March-November) & 10 am - 4:30 pm (December-February)
Entry Fees: Rs. 10 (Indians) & Rs 150 (Foreigners)
Photography Charges: Rs. 300, restricted by permission.
Video Charges: Prohibited
Time required for sight seeing: 3 hrs
Relevant Links - 

1. Pixelated Memories - General Post Office

Suggested Reading -

1. Art-and-archaeology.com - Indian Museum, Calcutta
2. Photodharma.net - Statues & reliefs in the Indian Museum, Kolkata
3. Timesofindia.indiatimes.com - Article "Cholbe Na: Old order resists change" (dated April 10, 2012) by Subhro Niyogi
4. Timesofindia.indiatimes.com - Article "Facelift for Indian Museum" (dated Dec 16, 2010)
5. Timesofindia.indiatimes.com - Article "Harappa gallery locked for 10 years" (dated Feb 21, 2012) by Jhimli Mukherjee Pandey
6. Timesofindia.indiatimes.com - Article "Indian Museum in Kolkata wallows in apathy" (dated Apr 10, 2012) by Subhro Niyogi
7. Timesofindia.indiatimes.com - Article "New mask gallery at Museum" (dated Dec 21, 2003) by Nilanjana Bhowmick
8. Victorianweb.org - The Indian Museum, Kolkata, by Walter L. B. Granville
9. Victorianweb.org - Walter L. B. Granville (1819-1874)